32. Lots of responses from the Gun Lobby. Even one that wants to shoot me!

46. Honestly

There's no way in hell that all guns are gonna get confiscated without yet more gun violence.
A compromise is going to be reached.
Both sides will be unhappy with it.
I think that certain guns should be absolutely inaccessible to civilians, but civilians should be able to own firearms IF they pass a stringent battery of tests.

47. Please look up the word 'hyperbole' eom

65. Since I don't own or advocate the use of guns....

I won't reply to you in the same way that poster replied to me. I know what the word means and I know that the Gungeon denizen who commented that I should be taken out and shot for using it, probably owns a gun and possibly wishes he could use it.

There is never an appropriate time to imply someone should be shot. I am not surprised that he and you don't get that.

139. Not at all. Every gun owner has done his or her part in supporting and contributing to....

the industry that created this monster. Every bullet you buy is an endorsement of the gun industry and their lobbyist the NRA. Where do you thing these companies get their power from? It's out of the pockets of the people who buy their product. They are using your money right now...today...to send their goons to Washington to fight against even the most mild restrictions in gun ownership.

They aren't doing it with my money.

Sometime people have to buy necessities like gas and food from unsavory actors. We can only try to get what we need without hurting others by being selective. No one needs a gun unless they are police, military or in legitimate security. Everyone else is paying for the NRA and gun companies to let this insanity continue.

Is this HYPERBOLIC? I don't think so but you folks are welcome to take this post to the jury and have it blocked if it makes you feel right.

141. What you own is irrelevant to a Constitutional argument.

The Second Amendment is beginning to look like the Framers second biggest error after slavery. It's not effective in resisting tyranny. No uprising is going to stand against the US military. You're AK-47 isn't going to stop that drone from putting a missile between your eyes.

The Arab Spring tells you that you don't need to start with a heavily armed civilian population to resist. In fact, in Libya, having so many people armed after the revolution has been an impairment in establishing a new, effective government. What appears to be important in an uprising is information, not firearms. The Internet brought about the Arab Spring and kept it going. In other words, the First, not the Second Amendment protects us more.

For self-defense, statistically, you're several times more likely to die of a gunshot wound if you live in a house with a firearm, and you're more likely to commit suicide.

The proposed solution to gun violence is more guns. As though firearms have to reach a critical mass before the Second Amendment works the way it should? That proportion is somewhere above a 1:1 gun-to-person ratio we have. Yes, I'm certain the Founders wrote that very thing when they formulated the Second Amendment, and recommended that people have at least one musket per hand. I'm also certain they anticipated the exact problems private gun ownership is causing when they concocted the right to keep and bear arms.

In other words, guns don't perform the function they're purportedly meant to, neither as an impediment to tyranny nor as a means of self-defense. (Not that they can't in all cases, just statistically speaking, they don't.) Historically, tyrannies like the Nazis did not confiscate or illegalize guns for the general population. In fact, the Nazis expanded gun ownership.

The Second Amendment needs to be reconsidered, whether you're personally attached to your guns or not.

226. Every dollar you spend is a vote for the world you want to live in. So, being a gun owner...

puts you voting for a world with guns, gun violence, and senseless killings of kids. The money you spent is used to fund the gun lobbyists who buy our politics and keep this endless cycle of death going, all in the name of profit for gun manufacturers.

161. Sadly, you do have a point.

I am ALL for reasonable regulations on guns, TBH. In fact, I'd be perfectly okay with a ban on factory-direct full-auto assault weapons as well as more limited capacity on semi-auto weapons.....but blaming ALL gun owners for the tragic death of this one girl is simply going way too far; and in fact I'll go a step further and say that it makes us all look bad and gives ammo to the very forces who oppose us, especially the NRA and such.

181. It ain't Chronic in those chambers

We need to share a fatty and talk about your attitude towards victimless crime. If drugs were legal there would be no turf wars over them.
To confuse pot smokers with crankers, tweekers, basers, firers, junkies, coke flunkies and Kroc rotters is absurd. The reason pot isn't the general center of drug crime is that it's bulky. Here in medical marijuana country the cost of pot has gone down from $320 an ounce in 2000 to less than $150 today (check Craigslist in Oregon under health and beauty).

197. You are confusing the issue.

You are correct "it aint the chronic in those chambers", however would that chamber had been loaded in the first place if there was no market for illegal drugs?

The illegal drug market for MJ alone is between $35 and $45 billion dollars a year in the US (How big is the marijuana market). That is a lot of easy money. The distribution networks across the entire country are run, maintained, and operated by primarilly gangs. In the US today there are an estemated 1.5 million gang members spread throughout every state and community.

The pot smoker is no less or more responsible for the violence in our nation than gun owners.

A pot smoker who buys an ounce from a dealer has directly and willfully contributed to a network of violence that is responsible for up to 80% of crime in the US.

That dealer buys from a supplier, that supplier buys from a distributor, that distributor buys from a producer. Every single one of these steps throughout the process is illegal throguhout the vast majority of the US. So basically you have a network of criminals, who want to make lots of easy money distributing their product for cash.

If one dealer has a problem with another dealer trying to take away his customers, they cannot up their advertizing costs, they cannot do a market study, they cannot put together a focus group. They take care of the other dealer through violence. If a customer steals from a dealer, the dealer cannot call the police, they cannot file a claim in court, they deal with it through violence. If a supplier is not making sales because another supplier is moving in on their network, again, they resort to violence.

The problem is that the statement that pot is not a "victimless crime" is not 100% accurate. The simple "illegal" purchase of pot: fuels, funds, and promotes gang violence in this country.

You state that "The reason pot isn't the general center of drug crime is that it's bulky.", this is not an accurate statement. Pot is the #1 illegally traded and consumed drug in this nation.
Annual Prevelance in the US
Opioids - 5.90
Opiates - 0.57
Cocaine - 2.40
Cannabis - 13.70
Amphetamines - 1.50
Ecstasy - 1.4

Directly because of the violence that the trade in illegal drugs brings is why I do not smoke pot. This is why I want ALL drugs to be legal. The war on drugs in this country is a complete failure.

200. Agree with the last bit, only...

have you ever bought a diamond? Bought one for my gal for x-mas even though I know the violence associated with 'em (yeah, shame on me)
Yep, drug laws gotta go.
I do take exception to your chain of command of responsibility. I smoke pot and do not accept responsibility for some inner city yahoo with a pea shooter and a head full of meth or pcp or banana peels. Likewise, I like an occasional Big Mac but don't take responsibility for two-ton Bert and Bertha or Ron Jeremy's cardiac condition.

202. Whatever helps you sleep at night.

You state that you bought a diamond, even knowing the violence associated with it. Seriously WTF? You personally paid money into a violent system that will directly promote and fuel that violent system.

Yes I have bought a diamond. This was many many moons ago before I was aware of the blood and violence involved in bringing me that diamond. Will I today spend my money on another? Hell no I will not. How could I directly put money into such a deplorable industry that will in turn fan the flames of more violence? If people stopped buying the damn things the result would be that the violence would stop.

I do not buy pot, not because it is illegal, but because of the blood that was spilled to bring it to me.

If you turn a blind eye to the reality of why drug dealers, distributors, suppliers, and producers have guns, and commit acts of violence in the first place, you are simply deluding yourself.

207. Not sure I agree with that

"I do not buy pot, not because it is illegal, but because of the blood that was spilled to bring it to me."

I think most pot sales do not involve product that comes from the cartels. Besides many people grow their own. And thirdly, even if you were to buy cartel product from a dealer (which I applaud you for not doing), I would think the blame would lie more on those who make it illegal in the first place, since it should not be.

The gun argument may actually be a better fit for this logic, since people don't make their own, there is an underground gun market that was not solved by the fact that guns are legal (criminals don't want to go through normal channels to buy their weapons), and there is a strong gun lobby that makes sure we don't have reasonable regulation and control of who has guns. Maybe a better argument along those lines would involve NRA membership rather than gun ownership, since the NRA is a large part of the gun lobby, but many if not most gun and ammo purchases probably do feed into the pro gun lobby, so there is some responsibility there.

220. What you think, and what is reality differ from each other.

"I think most pot sales do not involve product that comes from the cartels." - 66% of all marijuana sold in the US comes from Mexico.

But it is not the cartels that I am referring to. I am referring to the 1.5 million people in the US who are members of a gang. Gangs are funded and fueled by the illegal trade in drugs. The #1 illegally traded drug in the US is marijuana.

Yes, folks do grow their own, however out of the millions of tons of pot that is smuggled into this country every year, there is a huge market for the product. To ignore that fact, one would be deluding themselves. Even domestically grown MJ has a direct impact on the violence in this nation. If pot is grown in quantity domestically and sold on the street there is a direct correlation to violence that stems from this trade.

If it is illegal to purchase pot in your state, and you purchase pot, you are directly contributing to the violence that occurs here.

225. Sorry that's just ridiculous

You contributed to the violence only if your purchase is related to those violent elements. And in the post of yours that I originally responded to, you said the reason you wouldn't smoke it was you didn't want to contribute to that violence, which to me was an indictment on pot smokers as contributing to that violence, which in some cases would be true, others not. I would think mostly not. You threw out an unsourced 66% which may or may not have any relation to reality, I don't know how anyone could tabulate such stats since most such sales would never be seen. I don't care to get into an argument about more or less than half, I'm just supporting whatever percentage has no relation to that chain of violence you speak of, which is certainly significant and those people should not be tarnished as contributing to something to which they have absolutely no connection.

As I said above, the gun argument you made is more relevant, IMO. The pot issue struck me as a poor comparison, that's all, and it still does. Not that it really matters to the discussion of this OP.

208. No blood spilled when ya grow your own meds

Yeah, the diamond... I know WTF??? X-mas+pawnshop+girlfriend=macho offering (I am weak and I have sinned)

Hey, I'm out of the drug loop. Home-made meds like home-made biz (I'm a contractor) remove me from the middleman syndrome. I take responsibility regarding this life and advise all to do likewise. I am far from deluded in supplying my own needs. Gonna brew beer this year for the same reason.
The criminality of drug use is perpetuated by governments for control of the populace. It is in the best interest of the monied powers that inner cities remain in fear and at war. By moving to Oregon from LA I've sought to minimize any connection to the horde.

I'm not an escapist, don't have a buried u-haul full of water bottles in the backyard and sleep just fine, thank ya.

221. I never mentioned "grow your own".

If you purchase or have purchased pot, you have directly funded those that actually contribute to the violence in this country.

I have done it in the past. I have handed money to a pot dealer, who may have in turn killed someone to protect his corner, or turf, or whatever. I cannot live with that, so I stopped. I will not be directly responsible for the majority of the violence in this nation.

244. The last I heard this poor child was shot by a bullet. Every single company that...

produces those bullets in this country PAYS the NRA with their customer's money to ensure these guns and bullets flood this country at an obscene rate. If you can't see the difference then I expect you will continue to pay the gun industry to promote things like "Stand Your Ground" and no background checks. I am sure they are happy for your support!

166. +1

239. Laying blame on the innocent is a despicable guilt tactic

While I believe that we could certainly use some strong gun control laws, the idea that *everyone* who owns a gun is responsible for this girl's death is bizarre. The person responsible for the girls death is the one that frigging shot her. You may despise guns, you may fear them, you may believe that the second amendment is outdated, or whatever. None of that gives you the right to blame the innocent though. And yes, most gun owners are innocent of doing anything wrong or even illegal.

Like I said, I support gun control, but these hyperbolic tactics are extremely ignorant. You're using generalizations - a very broad brush, this is one of the very last places we should use such things.

100. I'm not a gun owner or a fan of guns in general...

...but we have to keep in mind that when they say, "...from my cold, dead hands," an attempt to repeal the 2nd amendment is exactly what a lot of these people have been obsessing over and "preparing" for. It's absurd to assume that some (likely significant) portion of the gun owning public won't come unhinged and become violent in the face of any attempt to restrict/control all guns.

105. Yup

146. I thought the purpose of guns were to protect you.

If people are dying only to protect their guns, they've gone insane.

Most of us aren't insane. On some level, they'll figure out it defeats the purpose of having a gun if you die to keep it. When a cops have people at gunpoint and say, "Drop it," there aren't too many who don't.

Therefore, I don't think people are going to go into general civil war to for their guns. I think pro-gunners have wrapped themselves in a fantasy world. If the reality of actually dying for it becomes salient, they'll leave the few LaPierres to draw the drone missiles away from them while they themselves drop their rifles in the field and go home.

153. That is the most likely outcome.

Pretty sure 99% of these unreasonable gun fanatics (which, I think is a relatively small percentage of people that own guns) are just paper tigers.

But there are some folks that have been living that "life" since the day they were born. The ones that served in the military, the ones that are trained. Even some of the weekend warriors in the Natl. Guard might betray their country and try to play Rambo with their militia buddies.
Those are going to be the ones holed up in the hills and deserts, holding out until their self-fulfilled prophecy comes to be.

On a side note.
Remember all the "Zombie Apocalypse" training lately by various armed groups, including our govt. and at least one militia I know of.
Makes me wonder what they're REALLY training for, since zombies don't exist.

119. Absolutely -Society Should Not Be Held Hostage By Fear

178. Ain't gonna happen and here is why..

1. Probably the only bizness that is making money during a recession. Gun money has bought enough politicians to derail any legislation to limit dollars leaving their pockets (gun makers and pols).

2. State of Fear. The media's (bought and paid for) use of hyperbole to foment outrage is really a spur to create more gun sales.

3. State of Fear2. The average American is not an educated Metrosexual. These are people who still think the British are coming over the hill, Indians will attack come nightfall and Al-Queda is having a little nap between planes.

79. Nope. She was just one person amongst many in one of those marching bands.

185. Guns and esteem issues

It's all about perceptions of power. Some little shit with no life had to take down the kid that makes it.

It's like owning a "vette cuz the pleasure pickle's a mini jerkin.

Ohhhh, see me, fear me, I have a gun.
That lesson is instilled in us by history books, military advertisements (Be all that you can be), television, movies, books and games.

Wanna cut violence in inner cities? Create jobs, education and paths to success. But the money guys in this country don't want you to succeed. They want you under the thumb and thug-lite is replaying that. More guns will be sold.

Only once we evolve as a species will the violence stop. Only once we remove money as the power equator will the violence stop.

26. It is predominantly due to the resurgence of gangs

and gang wars. It's a horrid problem, and it's taking down too many innocent children in the process. It may seem far away from many of us, but it touches us all, for these are all OUR kids. It touched us even personally a few years ago. My husband had a teaching assistant assigned to his class whom he liked enormously, an extremely dedicated and intelligent young African American graduate student. One day she called to say she suddenly couldn't be at class: her young 13-year-old cousin had been killed while driving home with an older brother and younger sister from a basketball game. As the shooters opened fire on their car, he threw himself over his little sister and was killed. We were devastated, shocked, and ... helpless.

To get a better understanding of retaliation killings and what people are trying to do about it, watch The Interrupters, the 2011 documentary from Kartemquin Films and the people who produced Hoop Dreams.

176. that lead is still everywhere. and that is just about right. gang leaders are in their 30's and 40's

Now, researchers say they may have found the perfect scapegoat for violent crime: leaded gasoline.
A new study has revealed that the rise and fall of leaded gasoline strongly correlates with the pattern of violent crime rates in America.

58. Change the economic cliamate and...

Make every opportunity for gang members to to be come ex-gang members.

If there were more jobs that paid more $$$ gang numbers would be reduced. They are in gangs because they feel there is no hope and this is the climax of their expectation of power. Change their social economic situation and you reduce not eliminate the problem.

As long as this country continues to boil down peoples ability to make it and as long as it is a constant struggle to get simple things there will always be GANGS..

233. Never mind the 19th century, the Romans had street gangs. (nt)

186. Gangs since Neanderthal

We are a gang society. It's survival and it's always been with us. Consider Europe in the dark ages or Hitler's Brown shirts. A union is a gang. Association is a fancy word for gang. Corporations are gangs with money, their weapons aren't guns though, their weapons are laws and votes and they enforce their will with another gang....called the police.

50. Attack teachers unions under the fake pretext that there's a budget gap, then

go back to Wall Street for more millions more in pocket cash for a few month's work...

Sorry! That was Chicago's mayor typing, he grabbed hold of my keyboard while I was getting coffee.

First off, we need to stop economic war against the 99%. Those folks that are doing the shooting need a future to look forward to. Right now, they are feeling perma-fucked, and for good reason. Desperate situations make terrible behavior more likely.

Second, our burgeoning penal system, which focuses on making "we're tough on crime" political points and couldn't care less about actual rehabilitation, just makes the situation worse. It has become grad school for criminal studies instead of a way to return to life as a member of decent society.

Third, we need strong gun control all across America. States with stronger gun control have fewer gun deaths. I note that Illinois scores only 35% on the Brady scorecard, perhaps its time for the rest of the state to do the right thing.

61. The "gun death" rate is not an accurate measure of how safe a place is. The overall murder rate is.

States with stronger gun control have fewer gun deaths.

That's generally true, but if murder rates were correlated with strong gun laws, California would be one of the safest states. But it's not - Our crime rates are nothing to brag about. Also, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Wyoming would be dangerous places.

The areas where crime rates are high are great distances from states that have looser gun laws, especially compared to East Coast locations with high crime rates. I think poverty rates and population density are better predictors of crime rates.

77. Washington State has far more lax laws than California.

80. Really?

"The areas where crime rates are high are great distances from states that have looser gun laws"
I see higher rates in Louisiana, Mississippi, Arizona and South Carolina than in New York, California, Massachusetts, etc... The only Midatlantic or New England state with a murder rate of 6.0 or higher is Delaware.
Tell me again about East Coast violence and looser gun laws. Last time I checked, Mississippi has some pretty lax laws.
Your comment about poverty rates might be a little more to the point, but your data belies the rest of your point.

83. You've indulged in a bit of cherry-picking, which is reasonable considering that I did as well.

Can we agree that focusing on "gun deaths" rather than the overall risk of becoming a murder victim is another kind of selective viewing of data?

Motor vehicle accidents pose a much greater risk to most of us than crime does. I was almost struck by two vehicles last night while crossing one street once. Fortunately I was able to alert both drivers to my presence by shining a 200 lumen flashlight in their faces. That and a knife are the only weapons I carry.

86. Sure

And, like I said, I agree that poverty rates are as much of a predictor as anything else. I'm not sure about pop. density - looking again at the South, I would need to see some of the states broken down individually. Is the rate higher in New Orleans than in the rest of Loiusiana? I would imagine so. Mississippi is not a densely populated state, but it is a poor one. I believe that they're at the top of the "taker" list (even though they vote Republicans in to national offices, have a Republican governor and, I believe, a Republican legislature). But, they're more concerned with making abortions illegal then fixing their economic woes.

130. I think that state is Maryland, not Delaware.

104. Excuse me. California is one of the low per-capita gun death rates states.

A San Francisco-based policy center on gun control laws has produced a report that says states with strict gun laws have the lowest gun-related death rates. In contrast, it reports, states with the highest per capita gun death rates have "weak" gun laws.

The study by the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence is touted by Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) as support for his own legislation tightening California's current assault weapon ban. The bill, SB47, would prohibit semiautomatic weapons from having devices that allow them to carry high-capacity magazines or easily be reloaded with multiple rounds of ammunition. A similar version of the bill failed to pass in 2012.

. . . .
He failed to mention the law center also included California on its list of states with the strongest gun control laws and lowest gun-releated deaths. The center declares California has the toughest gun control laws in the nation and gives the state an "A minus" on its report card, a designation shared only with New Jersey and Massachussetts.

The highest per-capita gun death rates were in Alaska, Louisiana, Montana, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Wyoming, Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi -- states that the law center said have weak gun control laws.

107. The map in my previous post shows that Califonria is not one of the lowest per-capita murder states

Senator Yee's stupid bill would make it illegal for certain rifles that already exist to have one of the most important safety features of any firearm - The ability to quickly unload the weapon without cycling unfired rounds through the chamber.

I don't really care about "gun death" rates. Focusing on just crimes committed with guns is a canard used by gun prohibitionists.

204. Gun deaths are the topic at issue.

Your map is old. The LA Times article is more recent. I also heard this news on the radio last week. California's tighter gun laws coincide with a reduction in gun deaths. As I understand it, in all but one neighborhood of LA, gun deaths have declined.

106. Agree!

67. Here is how I'd handle it.

I would make every single gun transaction, public and private, require registration of the firearm to the owner. Then, if the firearm is used it the commission of a crime, be it by someone who had it legally or illegally, I would advocate that it be traced to the last person it was registered to and hold THEM partially accountable unless they can provide a police report saying the firearm was stolen.

I believe this would go a LONG way in making sure that less guns end up in the hands of criminals as the people selling them to, or buying them for, the gangs and criminals might think twice.

40. Now that makes sense,

242. This was not a person of stature

She was a regular kid whose band played at the inauguration. While that is quite an honor, I highly doubt that anybody around her felt that this elevated her to a different status.

And the thing about rappers and athletes doesn't make sense either. The killers of Tupac and Notorious B.I.G. have never come forward, so it's hard to argue that their goal was notoriety.

Actually, the Tupac murder was almost certainly the culmination of an ordinary street beef. His crew had fisticuffs with another crew, and members of the latter crew settled the score with a gun. Tupac himself admitted that he would probably die young because of his wild behavior.

18. Everyone has the right to live

35. Yep. She should've been carrying to protect her rights, right?

Some wrongheaded Americans love their rights to as many effing guns and as much ammo as they can afford rather than their fellow American's life that, well, don't seem to give them the "warm and fuzzies" their killing devices do. I mean, hey . . . if twenty SLAUGHTERED six-year-olds isn't enough for those Americans to rethink their arming-themselves-to-their-teeth fetish, what will, right?

42. No, it probably wouldn't have made any difference

89. Right.

Because her horrible fate was set with this particular scumbag and not any other.

Yet according to you, it's far less plausible that were guns illegal and not as easily accessible or cheaply manufactured by the millions by corporate firearm manufacturers as they are today, she would still be targeted by a scumbag who escaped prison sentencing only now, without have access to cheap illegal firearms that can be bought ON LINE, he'd be wielding a kitchen knife or maybe even a molitive cocktail.

Face it. This country's fetish with guns is the reason why this girl and twenty innocent six-year-old babies were slaughtered, not because some deranged scumbag decided to go on a killing spree "just cuz". They had the means; they didn't have to look their victims in the eye, and it doesn't matter if they had "the motive".

110. Unreasonable, isn't it?

But no less unreasonable than your silly strawman argument about some random scumbag armed with a deadly weapon designed TO KILL who just happens to be the designated scumbag that our laws, according to you, were too lax to keep in jail.

Thank you for proving that some fetishes are really too hard for some people to break free of.

134. In your feverish pursuit of chasing down whatever distraction you can find

in order not to have to face the cold-hard truth, you're forgetting ONE MAJOR detail here: he had a gun; a killing weapon; a weapon designed to KILL. And he used it for that purpose to take a young girl's life like it was nothing.

The "mentally unstable" excuse is wearing very thin. There are sociopaths and gangs all across the globe, and in every demographic and every race, yet the stats for gun-related slaughters seem to be all concentrated in this so-called civilized society with a corrupted 2nd Amendment law - the United States.

Why's that? Well, guns are much too easy to get a hold of. Even when bought legally, fully registered, and by a person who passes all mental health tests (should they ever administer any - *that ain't gonna happen considering our sorry state of access to health services in this country as well), they somehow always wind up in the hands of "scumbags" with "bad natures" slaughtering kids as easily as taking out their trash. If you can't see that this country has a serious gun problem that's killing our fellow Americans at terrifying rate just so a few gun-nuts can kiss their firearms every night, then perhaps our lawmakers can in order to protect the rest of us who do.

217. That would be the optimal solution, if it could be done IMHO ...

The problem is, it can't. Therefore, we have to make compromises because it's not fair/safe for only the criminals (amongst the general populace) to have the guns ... which is what would happen if we just outlawed them outright w/o having the means and will to actually take every single one of them away.

But if your argument is we'll all automatically be repressed if it were the situation (i.e. only the 'government' had the guns) I'd just point to the dozens of first and second world countries where that is exactly the case ... yet people are not being repressed any more than we are here with our 300,000,000 firearms in private hands.

IMHO you have to either be a gun fetishist or generally prone to irrational beliefs to conclude that our 300M guns in private hands are the 'source' of our 'liberty' in this country. There's simply WAAAAY too many other free countries where almost nobody has guns outside the government.

59. My gut reaction is that the South Side should be razed by bulldozers

The city should relocate those that are trying to make something of their lives and put the gangsters and street trash behind bars where they belong. But I know that's not going to happen, cannot happen.

93. Of course they will. It's perfect for them.

218. Oh, of COURSE ...

I heard somewhere there's now Newtown 'Truthers' (lol at them copying the 9/11 skeptics nomenclature). Think it might've been a clip from Alex Jones website I saw on DU the other day.

I say there's NO DOUBT that by tomorrow AM if one were to go to Freeptardville there will be some heavily trafficked thread full of wingnut gun fetishists promulgating this EXACT conspiracy theory ... Obama 'had her whacked'.

I imagine the office shooting that happened a couple miles away from my office in Phoenix this afternoon will be the source of similar rantings ... in fact, in these people's minds, EVERY GUN CRIME that happens from now on will be Obama having people killed to help him pass the American 100% Gun Confiscation Act that they just KNOW he's working on. And that's, of course, so that he eventually can ship all the right-wing 'patriots' to the FEMA camps without a fight and turn America into a Communist Muslim paradise.

Not that a lot of us didn't do the exact same type of crazy thinking back in the days of the DimSon (in fact I admit to remaining to this day firmly in the LIHOP camp), but ... I'd like to think we didn't engage in stupidity of QUITE that magnitude.

73. That sounds targeted. Who done it?

88. The 2nd amendment

Has been twisted into a Constitutional mandate to the right to own any firearm and to use it any way a person would want. Not sure how we got here but that argument is absurd. I believe we need to either repeal or re-define the second amendment to help us move past this to a more honest debate on how to fix the problem. Repealing or re-writing it WOULD NOT, in itself, prevent people from owning a gun but it would remove this fixation on a "right" to own a gun. The Constitution should no more give a right to own a gun than a car or house or boat. Our Constitution is a set of principles that denote who we are and how our government should work and the relationship between the citizen and government. There should never be a "right" to own something, be it a person or an object. It has no place in a document like the Constitution. We have LAWS that denote the terms by which we can own an object or not own one. We may want to own an elephant but there are laws that control the terms and conditions by which we can own an elephant. Why should guns be any different than anything else?

222. It says 'keep and bear' ... which are terms associated with military usage ...

It most certainly does NOT say "sell", nor does it expressly say "own".

I think the only avenue available to assail it is on those grounds (since outright repeal is clearly not plausible).

Passing federal laws regarding 'sales' and 'ownership' do not violate the letter (nor the spirit, IMHO) of this Amendment, so I think that's how we need to frame the common-sense legislation at a national level that so many of us here are in favor of.

94. We need to treat guns like a new panademic. And the vaccine is putting a ring around it

a panademic needs a host, give the vaccine to enough people, and there is no where for the panademic to continue. It dies out.

takes a while, not immediate.

the legal guns in a state without major controls, allows gun murderers to murder in a state where hter are big restrictions

The NRA as a terror org. with million dollar soundbytes, tries to drown that out.

They focus(many times on blacks, btw, or other minorities, trying to terrorize their core groups who are in sycnch with the old JOhn Birch society mentality and try to say it is their fault

Faulty logic

it is the legal guns, the legal gun dealers, the gun shows that get those guns into Illinois.

Because a legal driver, who isn't speeding, has no broken mirrors or lights, drives like he is not hiding aynthing, can easily bring 100 guns into an area with no one knowing
(no matter the laws, no one sees it)

No more mr. nice guy
more security, and yes, checkpoints before entering a state

The repubs want border patrols in the south, well, let's have border patrol by the feds,
at each state's border. Zero tolerance.

and turn back anyone found with a gun going into the states that have laws saying no to that.

Put a ring around it.

Then make new laws and deal one at a time, with all the guns in the streets
legal and illegal

152. Check points at the state???

There are tens of thousands of entry points for the 50 states. A gun is very easy to hide. So every car entering a state would have to be torn apart -- not to mention the hundreds of thousands of trucks traveling through. Wow.

... Police say she was not in a gang nor the intended target of a fatal Tuesday shooting. Hadiya's family and classmates are left to mourn her death after police say she was shot in the back while hanging out with a group of teens in a park at 2:30 p.m. Tuesday ...
Chicago girl who performed at inauguration shot dead
http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/local&id=8973551

121. It can't be, because they we can't blame our political enemies for it.

I suspect it was Rush Limbaugh who did it... wait did they say "jumped the fence"? Okay, maybe Sean Hannity would be more realistic. Better yet, maybe it was Paul Ryan. I heard he once jumped the grand canyon.

135. You might be right...

... but you don't know that for sure -- any more than I know for sure that it *was* right wing. Admittedly, we're both guessing. But I have long since learned that the RW doesn't deserve the benefit of any doubt.

167. My slip is showing? What does that even mean?

Real reform would be universal background checks, limit mags to 10 rounds, prosecute all gun violations with tough penalties, Just to name a few.
There are extremists on both sides of the issue that are drowning out the sensible people who truly want to do the right thing.
You have on the far right those that say there should be no restrictions on firearms, and on the far left, you have those that want to repeal the 2A and confiscate all firearms.
How is this conductive to an honest debate?

175. Indeed so.....n/t

188. Yeah, we should shoot them

I think the adults are the problem. Where else do our kids get their education.
Let's not be exclusionary. Consider that Vietnam was ended because of youth protest and that only adults can take a country to war under false pretenses.
The Military-Industrial Complex needs to be recognized for what it is; fear-mongering profiteers who don't care whether we live or die just as long as they can make a buck at it. It's not extremism, it's bizness.

148. Why have we let it get so out of hand?

We watched gangs arm themselves in our cities and did nothing meaningful to stop them, why?
We watched gun accidents rise across our country and did nothing meaningful to reverse them, why?
We watched the rise of violent games and movie content and did nothing, why?
We were told that being strong and having the largest military in the world would make us free, why did we believe those lies?
Are you ready to change that now?

199. You'll find that most of the gun humpers.....

are nothing but grown up bullies with self-esteem issues and when confronted by a real man who doesn't tremble in their presence, well, they show their true colors and show themselves for the cowards they are.

171. THE BEST WAY OF STOPPING A BAD GUY IN THE FIRST PLACE IS A GOOD BACKGROUND CHECK!!!

i swear he gave wayney the stink-eye when he said that

James Johnson,

The organizations in the National Law Enforcement Partnership to Prevent Gun Violence are united in urgently calling on Congress to:
• Require background checks for all firearm purchasers;
• Ensure that prohibited purchaser records in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), are up-to-date and accurate; and
• Limit high capacity ammunition feeding devices to ten rounds.
Seven of our nine groups, including the largest organizations among us, also support a ban on
2
assault weapons and Senator Feinstein’s legislation.
http://www.judiciary.senate.gov/pdf/1-30-13JohnsonTestimony.pdf

174. Only cowards use guns on unarmed persons

I'm going to start saying that, only cowards shoot unarmed people.
In 71 years I have never needed a gun.
But to be fair, the military has done a great job of putting people in harms way and making them fearful for their safety when they return to civilian life.

203. Goddamit to fucking HELL! How long are we going to tolerate this?

210. I've been asking that

since the 60s/70s. When will it ever end? Sadly, it won't. Not as long as there are humans. My daughter was born in 1968 (a pretty violent year). I asked that question then and am asking it now. Only then, I had hope. Now I'm not so sure.

213. As long as we let lobbyists buy our congress people

216. Very sad and it continues to drive home the need for gun control

I don't blame the people who have guns, but the people who oppose gun control. Those are a small (but very vocal) subset of those who own guns. They will continue to obstruct as more people get killed.

As an aside, I can see this as a new right wing conspiracy already. Not only was she in the inauguration parade, she's from Chicago. The right is going to come up with all kinds of twisted stories about this.

238. There is a straight line between our state's budget woes and the surge in murders

A few years a go the murder rate was down. The penalties for unlawful possession of a firearm and felon in possession went up, dudes started getting pinched with guns and they were going away for a long time, like 2-5 years. Folks started carrying guns less, fewer murders.

Contrary to popular perception, this surge in murders in Chicago have little to do with fights over drug turf. It is imbeciles shooting other morons over trivial shit. Insults on facebook. Being "disrespected". Fools will always be fools but fools with guns are very dangerous. Also, many of the leaders of the big gangs - Gangster Disciples come to mind - have gone away and won't be getting out. So different subsets or cliques of the same gangs are shooting each other. Teenagers killing teenagers.

OK, back to the fiscal story. Illinois cannot house enough prisoners nowadays. Heck, there are prisons built that can't be staffed. We are selling a prison to the Feds. Illinois is worse than broke - we don't pay out bills. So since the state won't house these shitheads the charges get tossed or plead down - instead for IDOC time it is plead to time served in county.

So, what is going to change because of this poor girls murder? Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Sure there will be a march of the reverends (many of whom are in bed with gangs). Rahm may shed another tear at this funeral. But the resources and the will to crack down is not here and will not return.

(Also, the Chicago Police Department has by and large retired in place. Moral is in the toilet. Manpower is down because...wait for it...the City is broke.)